The Devil’s In The Details: CT Thru-hike Prep

It’s rather last minute…

Soon this will all be on its merry way to whichever town stop it has been packed for. Organized chaos at the last minute as I double and triple check the contents before I leave tomorrow to begin my attempt at the Colorado Trail.

I’ve been pecking at it for weeks now, but I do my best work at the 11th hour. I feel confident I will be well fed, but not over packed. There will be wiggle room of an extra day’s worth of meals — and plentiful snacks.

What has changed…

Since I last posted, while getting into the swing of this packing bonanza, I was tested for h. Pylori and it came back positive. This is not at all uncommon, but the regimen of antibiotics is going to be an unpleasant part of the beginning of my hike.

I will have to be diligent to eat and take the medication. This is actually a good thing for me: I said it before, but I’m terrible at eating on trail. Now I will have to because the antibiotics must be taken with food.

What has stayed the same…

The food. Though I did add in a few things I otherwise would not have. I caved in and went with tortillas — those things weigh a metric tonne, let me tell you! And if I find I don’t want them… well, there’s hiker boxes for that. Plenty of other hikers swear by them.

What’s the plan, Stan?

I kept it simple: cereal type foods for the morning (oatmeal, cream of wheat, muesli) and tortillas with a variety of toppings for the other two meals. Some foods can be hot, some can be soup, some can be cold. It is all a matter of how I feel, and that versatility was important to me.

Tomorrow morning on our way to Denver (my roommate is driving me up), we’ll send off the boxes and that, as they say, will be that.

(I also made some homemade mac n cheese meals for certain boxes as waypoint victory meals. It’s the little things.)

So this is it?

Yep, this is the end of the planning and prep phase. I haven’t had much to say up to this point — it’s all repetitive and droll during this time. I thought about talking about my gear, or the pre-trail hikes, but none of it really stood out as something to talk about. I’ve done the local trails so many, many times. Packing boxes is not super exciting — even when I had to dump them all out because I made stupid mistakes with amounts of food.

Until now, I’ve just felt it was notable.

But here we are. Day 0. Tomorrow I will be headed to Watertown Canyon and taking my first steps on the Colorado Trail. This is where the fun begins!